Bulletin of Dental Education

Published as a supplement to the October issue of the JDE is a report from the Pipeline, Profession, and Practice: Community-Based Dental Education Program, edited by Dr. Howard L. Bailit, D.M.D., Ph.D. and Prof. Taegen L. McGowan, M.P.H.

The studies described in this supplement were devised to address the apprehension from deans who have been reluctant to support community-based dental education out of concern that it would result in losses to clinical income. One study compares senior clinic revenues and expenses in schools with extensive community-based education programs to schools with limited community-based education programs. Another study was guided by the question: does the community externship experience result in measurable positive changes in students’ productivity when they return to dental school clinics?

“Fifteen years ago the American Dental Association asked me to do a study on the financing of dental education,” said Dr. Bailit. “Out of this effort and grants from several national foundations, Dr. Formicola and I became interested in community-based dental education as one way to improve clinical dental education and at the same time provide dental schools a more stable source of operating funds.” The Pipeline program encouraged dental schools to increase the time that students and residents spend providing care to underserved patients in safety-net clinics and practices.

Studies in the report were conducted at schools such as the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry, Boston University Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine, The Ohio State University College of Dentistry, and the University of Michigan School of Dentistry. The discussion poses two questions: Does community-based dental education offer dental schools a new strategy to generate more net revenues? Does it provide dental students an equal or superior clinical education?

As discussed in the supplement, the answer is yes, community-based education can generate more revenue or reduce the cost of clinical education per student. Read more in the October 2011 JDE supplement at www.jdentaled.org.